Tatsuro Karitani Quotations

Many Japanese importers will have their last business day of the year on Wednesday. They needed the dollar for the year-end settlements of their businesses.

But the dollar will remain top-heavy due to lingering concerns over an eventual end of the zero interest rate policy in Japan and uncertainty over the prospect for the Chinese yuan.

Such reports apparently pushed down the dollar. The market has entered a correction phase and the U.S. currency may fall by another full yen.

Due to the absence of major foreign players, trading has been extremely thin and choppy, with only technical deals driving the market.

It seems that the ECB is now in a wait-and-see mode following the rate hike in December, which means that interest rate differentials between the US and Europe will not start narrowing (any time soon).

Dollar selling, spurred by rising expectations that U.S. rate increases have peaked, remains intact.

In the near-term, the euro seems to be hostage to downside risks against the Japanese yen due to growing interest for Asian currencies as a whole, and this is likely to weigh on the euro against the dollar.

Iran is a worrying issue that could trigger dollar selling.

The market had expected stronger inflationary pressures, so it was natural that players pared back some of their long dollar positions.

The unexpectedly strong result is likely to prompt yen buying particularly from foreign investors who take it as a sign that Japan's structural reforms will make progress.

The headline figure was only in line with expectations and therefore it did not have any impact on market perceptions about near-term monetary policy management by the Bank of Japan.

The dollar was a little affected by the talk but soon retreated.